


Steve, Bucky, and the Grocery Store Experience™

by plaguedbynargles



Series: The Stucky Experience [1]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Crack, Domestic Avengers, F/M, Fluff, Grocery Shopping, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, Period-Typical Homophobia, Pining, just if you squint, mention of steve and peggy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-29
Updated: 2016-06-29
Packaged: 2018-07-19 02:38:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,592
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7341268
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/plaguedbynargles/pseuds/plaguedbynargles
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Steve takes Bucky on his first 21st century grocery shopping excursion. First of a new little series of semi connected oneshots I'm doing. :)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Steve, Bucky, and the Grocery Store Experience™

**Author's Note:**

> THE TRADEMARK SYMBOL IS IRONIC MEANT FOR LAUGHS I'M JUST A BROKE COLLEGE STUDENT PLEASE DON'T SUE ME YOU HUMORLESS GOVERNMENT PICKLES.

               “Rogers, I’m sure it can’t be _that_ shocking.”

               Steve locked their car, taking one long, last look at it before they continued into the store. He was used to looking for his bike in a parking lot, but it wasn’t exactly practical when they’d be bringing groceries home, so he and Bucky had needed to take a car. Theirs was a deep Navy, and still smelled new due to disuse. Bucky hated it.

               “Just be ready,” Steve warned, shaking his head as they walked, “It’s a lot to take in.”

               The first time Steve had been to a 21st century supermarket, he’d spent a good 10 minutes staring at the apples and wondering if he’d just chosen a bad store, because there was no _way_ apples were really $1.50 per pound. Later, he’d been more than a little dismayed to find that _everything_ had suffered similar price increases.

               He still thought Starbucks was getting away with murder if they could charge _ten dollars_ for a bag of dry coffee. Unless Christ had risen again and ground it himself, Steve doubted it was worth the money.

               Now, it was his turn to introduce Bucky to the madness that was 21st century inflation and excess. Steve was almost a little jealous of how quickly Bucky was able to adjust to a lot of the things he’d initially struggled with, like technology, but then again, he supposed Bucky _had_ been at least partially conscious for the years Steve was asleep. And, while he hadn’t really been exposed to more domestic changes like the price of peaches, his effectiveness for HYDRA depended on being able to use the latest in technology, and he’d consequently learned iPhones faster than Steve.

               In a way, Steve liked the idea of having someone to complain about inflation with more than he liked the idea of teaching Bucky.

               Bucky cleared his throat, snapping Steve out of his reverie to see the other soldier standing a few paces away to the right. There were a couple of smaller stores in that direction—it made sense that Bucky would mistake those for what they were looking for. Nothing in the forties would have given Steve reason to imagine the _warehouse_ of food that was the modern supermarket.

               “You comin’, Rogers?”

               Steve frowned, nodding up at the massive concrete building in front of him, “Yeah…this is it.”

               Bucky inclined his head, uncertain if he’d heard correctly, “ _That’s_ it?”

               Steve nodded, and Bucky eyed the building with suspicion.

               “But it’s-!”

               “I know,” Steve said gently.

               “I know you said big but…Christ.”

               “Just wait until we get inside.”

               Bucky followed Steve through the automatic doors, intrigued. He’d bought things here and there after running from HYDRA, but never from a place like this. He watched curiously as Steve extracted a sort of wire box on wheels from a group lined up at the wall.

               “Shopping cart. To carry our stuff,” Steve offered an explanation, upon seeing the look on Bucky’s face.

               Bucky raised an eyebrow, “…Do we really need that much stuff?”

               Steve pushed the cart towards another set of automatic doors, “Trust me, we’re gonna want it.”

               Bucky stepped through behind him, and froze. There was more food in front of him than he’d ever seen before in his life.

               He wasn’t sure why the Hell they were at a produce market when Sam had mentioned he needed more ground coffee…but there were so many varieties of things that grew here that he was sure he could make up for it.

               “Rogers…what…what the Hell…” Bucky struggled, walking towards a crate of coconuts, “Why are _these_ …what the Hell is that?”

               Bucky abandoned his original thought and wandered over to another, smaller crate, this one filled with pink and green fruits covered in spines. Steve walked over, intrigued.

               “Dragonfruit,” Bucky gestured to the label at the back of the crate, “And they’re _nine_ dollars per pound.”

               Compared to that, Steve supposed, apples were cheap.    

               “Maybe they’re grown by actual dragons,” Steve teased.

               “Look like they’d be poisonous,” Bucky turned around to look at everything, “This is…a lot. But why’re we here? Sam said he needed coffee, and we need to go to the dry good-.”

               “Buck?” Steve tried to present the truth as gently as he could, “Coffee _is_ here. Everything is here. This is just the produce section.”

               Bucky spun around to study Steve, “Everything…is here,” he repeated.

               “Yeah.”

               “…Huh,” Bucky looked around them, appraising everything in a new light, “…Guess that’s convenient.”

               “I guess,” Steve conceded. If he was honest with himself, he still worried about what had happened to everyone that had run the separate, smaller shops. Everything was so much bigger, now. Maybe it had to be.

               They spent several minutes ogling the stranger varieties of produce; lychees, kiwis, horned melons, passionfruit, and a good deal of other things Steve hadn’t bothered paying attention to before. With Bucky, it was more exciting than daunting that there were more than two kinds of melon.

               “Alright,” Bucky said after a bit, surveying the mounds of produce around them, “What you got a taste for? What about bana-”

               “You know,” Steve hurriedly steered Bucky away from the one fruit he knew would make him, pun intended, go bananas, “I’m feelin like peaches today.”

               “Woah woah wait,” Bucky held his metal arm out to stop him when they reached the crate of peaches, frowning, “These…can’t be $2.99 a pound.”

               “Yeah, they can be,” Steve maneuvered past Bucky, “Everything’s more expensive, now.”

               Bucky looked at him as though he’d revealed that everyone also drank the blood of infants with dinner.

               “I know you said more expensive…” Bucky said slowly, “But this is fucking insane, Steve!”

               An elderly woman gathering apples gave them a dirty look, and Steve rolled his eyes.

               “I know. But it’s like that anywhere. Unfortunately.”

               Bucky threw up his hands, “Well, we might as well get the dragonfruits, then!”

               After Steve had reassured Bucky that they had so much money that the inflated prices didn’t matter, he reluctantly helped pick out the food. They ended up leaving the produce section with two dragonfruits, a handful of lychees, a sizeable bag of peaches, four plums, a variety of vegetables Wanda had wanted for a stir fry, and some kale that Bucky wrinkled his nose at.

               “Still think it’s not right what they’re doin,” Bucky grumbled, unaware of the bananas they were walking past. Steve hummed sympathetically. Truly, it wasn’t.

(o0o0o0o0)

               “Rogers…tell me this isn’t all cereal.”

               “This isn’t all cereal. They keep the maple syrup here, too,” Steve said evenly.

               Bucky flipped him off. Unfortunately, the same old lady they’d encountered in produce was passing by the mouth of the aisle at that precise moment, earning them another look of disapproval.

               “Yeah, and twenty different types!” Bucky exclaimed, “But Steve…c’mon, look at this,” he pulled a box off the shelf, “You’re tellin me they put chocolate _inside_ the cereal?”

               Steve actually went over to look at that one. He hadn’t seen it before, so either he was oblivious or they were inventing a new cereal every other week. Or both.

               “It’s like dessert for breakfast,” Bucky shook his head, “And look at this. Frosted wasn’t enough. They got a blueberry flavor and a strawberry one.”

               “Mix em up for an all American breakfast,” Steve smirked.

               Bucky snorted at that, perhaps inappropriately loud for the aisles of the neighborhood grocery store.

               “Why the Hell are they all rainbow?” Bucky had a box of Trix in one hand and a box of Fruit Loops in his other, “…It’s like they painted Corn Flakes!” he exclaimed, incredulous.

               “People will buy cereal whether or not it’s color coordinated to their outfit,” Steve stuck a box of Corn Flakes…the _normal kind_ …in the cart, “I don’t think Kellogg’s has caught on yet.”

               “Amen to that,” Bucky shook his head, “This is weird.”

(o0o0o0o0)

               “The _bread, too?_ ” Bucky was incredulous.

               Steve started to put a loaf of Ancient Grain bread into their cart, but Bucky stopped him.

               “Wait, get this one instead,” he handed Steve a new loaf, labeled 15 Grain.

               “Buck, I think they’re-”

               “This one’s label is purple.”

               Steve rolled his eyes and complied.

(o0o0o0o0)

               “Steve,” Bucky’s voice was deadly calm.

               “Yes?”

               “What…the fuck…have they done with Oreos?”

               Steve eyed the display Bucky was standing in front of. Cinnamon bun Oreos, watermelon Oreos, mint Oreos, birthday cake, chocolate, double stuff, triple stuff, mega stuff…whoever “they” was, they’d done a Hell of a lot.

               Just as Steve opened his mouth to speak, a pack of golden Oreos was shoved in his face.

               “What the _fuck_ is this? Why’re they vanilla? Why would they change it?” Bucky seemed genuinely distressed.

               “Bucky-”

               “Are you tryin to tell me,” Bucky violently put the package back on the shelf, “That never again will you or I taste a _real_ Ore-”

               “The real ones are by your feet, Buck.”

               Bucky fell silent, and looked where Steve indicated. Indeed, the normal Oreos were on a lower shelf.

               Bucky muttered something about how putting the “real” Oreos on a lower shelf was disrespectful to the heritage of the Oreo, and Steve solemnly agreed. Although, he had to admit that the double stuff was an ingenious invention, so he snuck a pack of those into the cart, too.

(o0o0o0o0)

               Bucky snickered. There was no fucking _way_ he was actually seeing this. There was no way that corporate executives sat down and decided this would be a good idea. That Dill Pickle flavored Lays Chips were a product they wanted on the shelves.

               “Hey Rogers,” he held up a green package, “If I pay you in inflated money, will you eat this whole bag?”

               Steve looked over from where he’d been considering a bag of “Jacked” Doritos to see Bucky grinning mischievously, and he held up his own bag of chips.

               “I’ll eat them for no pay if you eat these.”

               Bucky walked closer to look at the packaging, clearly designed to look urban and edgy. His forehead creased.

               “Why are they orange?”

               Steve shrugged off the question and smirked, waving the chips in front of Bucky, who snatched the bag from him, holding it up.

               “You tryin to kill me?” Bucky demanded. Steve put a hand to his chest, feigning offense.

               “Why, _I_ would _never-_ ”

               “-eat anything that advertises itself as ‘jacked’,” Bucky interrupted, putting the chips back on the shelf, “Glad that’s settled. They sellin this stuff to kids?”

               Steve scoffed, “Buck, it’s not _dangerous_!”

               “Mmm hm,” Bucky shook his head in distaste, “Says the man who jumped out of a plane-”

               “That was one time!” Steve exclaimed, drawing a few eyes in their direction. They’d have to be careful. The last thing they needed right now was to be surrounded by press dying to hear about Captain America’s friendship with the recently acquitted assassin James Barnes.

               Steve held up his hands in surrender, “Alright though, if you’re too chicken…”

               “Woah woah hey now,” Bucky was having none of that talk, “Tell you what, Rogers,” he snickered and leaned in slightly, lowering his voice, “We buy this one,” he held up the dill pickle Lays, “and a normal one, eat the normal one, and fill it with the fucked up chips, and leave it for Sam.”

               A startled laugh escaped Steve, “He’s gonna be so pissed,” he continued to chuckle, “Let’s do it.”

(o0o0o0o0)

               “They’re for convenience, but apparently they’re really bad for you,” Steve narrated while Bucky stood, wide eyed, in front of a cooler full of TV dinners.

               “That,” Bucky said slowly, clenching a fist, “Is so fucking cool.”

               “Yeah, I guess so.” The whole concept remained mostly alien to Steve, but if Bucky thought it was cool, it probably was.

               “Steve,” Bucky rounded on him, “How the _Hell_ can you not think this is cool? So you just stick it in the…the…”

               “Microwave.”

               “Microwave, and you have a fully cooked meal in front of you??”

               Steve shrugged, a small smile tugging at his lips, “Yeah, that’s…pretty much it.”

               Bucky glared, “ _How_ can you not see how _awesome_ this i-”

               Bucky’s sentence was cut off abruptly when something caught his eye across the aisle, causing his expression to transform into one Steve had never seen before on his face. He followed his gaze to see two men no older than twenty holding hands, considering an array of frozen potatoes.

               Steve blinked and turned back to Bucky, who was regarding him with a questioning expression.

               “Uh,” Steve carefully arranged his expression into a gentle smile, “More has changed since the forties than the price of peaches. Probably should have told you about that before we came here…”

               Bucky processed this carefully, “So in the 21st century…holding hands isn’t seen as…?”

               “Uh, no,” Steve pushed their cart out of the frozen aisle before Bucky remembered he’d wanted to put half of it into their cart, “Holding hands is the same. It’s just okay for everyone, now. Or, at least in this part of the country.”

               Steve bit his lip, worried he was babbling. He wasn’t certain why he suddenly felt so nervous.

               “Oh,” Bucky breathed, then cleared his throat loudly, “Oh.” There was a long pause, then, “There any other changes like that I need to know?”

               Bucky wore the tiniest of smirks when Steve looked at him, and for whatever reason it made Steve’s heart jump into his throat.

               “18 year olds can vote now,” Steve said, trying not to think about why he was so jittery, “And, uh, interracial marriage is legal. Same sex marriage, too.” It was a struggle to get that last part out.

               Bucky shook his head, “You know, other than the fucking prices, your Peggy woulda loved it here.”

               Steve wondered why Bucky sounded so sad when he said that. He’d barely known Peggy.

(o0o0o0o0)

               Despite Bucky’s protests, Steve forced them to take their entire cart (by the end of the trip, almost overflowing with food) to checkout, insisting again that _yes_ they had the money and _yes_ they were going to need all this food. Steve doubted HYDRA had fed Bucky any more than was necessary to keep him strong, and he fully intended on changing that pattern. A blessing and a curse of being supersoldiers was super _metabolisms_ , so sure, they could eat that extra buttery popcorn at the movies and not need to worry, but they also had to eat far more just to feel comfortably sated.

               Bucky muttered something about how he still wasn’t sure about all that, especially the stuff he’d thrown in their cart as a joke. Unfortunately, or fortunately, depending on how you take it, the cashier heard this, and decided to chime in.

               “Treat yo self.”

               They laughed their way to the car on that one. Bucky was hoisting about six bags full of groceries into the trunk at once when he was able to calm down enough to speak.

               “You know, it ain’t so bad, Stevie.”

               Steve turned to look at him, but Bucky was suddenly completely fixated on putting groceries into the car.

               “Seems like it’s so much easier for you, adjusting to everything,” Steve observed. Bucky put the last of the bags into the trunk and looked at Steve mysteriously.

               “It’s cause I don’t got a dame left behind,” he shut the unsaid second half of his sentence in the trunk with the groceries.

               _I just got you._

 

**Author's Note:**

> In case you guys didn't know, bananas were different in the 1940s! A plague wiped out the old variety almost in its entirety, so we started using the modern kind, which are less soft and sweet. I am a big fan of the popular headcanon that Steve and Buck lose their MINDS when they find out that bananas changed.
> 
> Anywho, hope you enjoyed! There should be a new one of these one shots posted every day until the fourth of July, after which updates may slow depending on my schedule. ^ _ ^


End file.
